1. We talk ourselves into energy or exhaustion. As we listen to someone who drags through life, and every other word they speak is some form of “tired” or “weary” or “exhausted”, sometimes we get tired just listening to them talk themselves into being tired!
Over time, negative thoughts and statements become a habit, persistently encroaching into our mental space without our deliberately choosing them. These negative thoughts are usually based on changeable circumstances, not eternal truths. They feel totally believable, even though often unrealistic and unreasonable. They pull us into a whirlpool of weary despair.
But when we’ve identified these automatic thoughts, 4we can challenge them and replace them with truth from God’s Word.
Isaiah 40:28-41: Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, does not faint or grow weary…He gives power to the faint and weary, and to him who has no might He increases strength, making it to abound….those who wait for the Lord, who expect, look for, and hope in Him, shall change and renew their strength and power; they shall lift their wings and mount up close to God as eagles mount up to the sun; they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint or become tired.
2. We talk ourselves into the fearful bondage of rejection and failure, or into the freedom of knowing we are accepted in Christ.
Proverbs 12:13: “The wicked is dangerously snared by the transgression of his lips, but the righteous shall come out of trouble.
Black and white thinking brings bondage. In this all-or-nothing- thinking, we tend to see things, ourselves and other people as being all wrong or all right; all good or all bad; total success or total failure. 2This mindset quickly filters out the good and focuses on the negative, and we begin to predict what will happen in the future based on our past fear. The reality is we all make mistakes. 4Bondage and hopelessness are like conjoined twins. Hopeless thinking must be replaced with Romans 15:13 (Amp): “May the God of your hope so fill you up with all joy and peace, through the experience of your faith, that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound and be overflowing, bubbling over with hope.”
3. We talk ourselves into living from labels and supposedly unchangeable conclusions. This takes away our freedom to change and grow. We live in a culture that labels everything. There are medical, educational, social, religious, gender and ethnic labels.
This destructive habit of labeling produces binocular thinking: We maximize our own strengths and qualities, while magnifying the weaknesses and mistakes of those whose labels are different than ours. Labeling is simply a politically correct form of name-calling, which very often leads to shame and rejection; or at the other end of the spectrum, entitlement and blame-shifting. Scripture is clear that because believers are filled with God’s kind of love, there is no room for that kind of thought and behavior.
1 Corinthinans13 5-7 (Amp): Love is not conceited, arrogant, rude or unmannerly. God’s love in us does not insist on its own way. It is not controlling, touchy, fretful or resentful; and love keeps no record of the evil done to it…Love bears up under anything and everything that comes. It is always ready to believe the best of every person, its hopes are fadeless under all circumstances; it endures everything without weakening.
Biblical Guidance counseling offers life-changing teaching about how our thinking and talking affects life and relationships. Call 580-774-2884 for more information about scheduling a personal appointment today. Ask how you can support this ministry and make an eternal difference for someone who struggles with life.
